Addressing the school readiness needs of children living in low-income communities as they transition into kindergarten is a critical, national policy issue. Miami-Dade County is one of the largest and most ethnically diverse counties in the United States, with challenging poverty rates and a large percentage of Latino and recently immigrated families from Central America, the Caribbean, and South America. Of urgent concern is that many children enter prekindergarten and kindergarten classrooms “not ready to learn,” and far too many have social, emotional, and academic needs that cannot be addressed by classroom teachers or school district resources. These concerns are especially evident in Title 1 Schools and schools targeted by the district for special intervention, where students have historically high failure rates.
Many children entering public schools have previously received educational services through community-based preschool programs, but before this initiative there was no way to assess service gaps across the transition to kindergarten, so as to identify and better address children’s school readiness needs. This project creates a formal research partnership among early childhood educational providers and the school district. The initial goal has been to build a research-practice partnership to improve coordinated early childhood research, practice, and policy, so as to support school readiness and early school success for all students.
Contact Us
Thank you for your interest. If you have specific questions, please see our contact information below.
Rebecca Shearer rshearer@miami.edu
Mark Needle applied_research@outlook.com
Steering Committee
University of Miami: Rebecca Bulotsky-Shearer
Early Learning Coalition (ELC) of Miami-Dade/Monroe: Anabel Espinosa
Miami-Dade County Head Start/Early Head Start: Maite Riestra, Angela McCoy
Miami Dade County Public Schools: Marisol Diaz
The Children’s Trust: Lori Hanson
Department of Children and Families: Sonia De Escobar (In process)
UM Center for Computational Science (CCS): Deepthi Puram
UM Children’s Registry and Information Systems (CHRIS): Christine Delgado
Facilitator: Mark Needle
